Education in Finland

So Finland is going to take over the world in mathematics and science pretty soon, eh? Well... at least per capita... maybe... ok, probably not, and even if they do take over per capita, it basically amounts to nothing in the end. I am well aware that that was not the article’s intent, but I thought I would poke some fun at Finland by inserting some American chauvinism into the mix. Also, not to attempt to refute the article, but I would like to point out the glaring irony that Finnish students’, teachers’, and schools’ successes are not measured by standardized tests, though Finland’s rank amongst other countries is based on standardized tests... I’m just sayin’.

A huge and very important difference is the perception of the profession of teaching by the Finnish people. Teachers need higher-level degrees? Teachers are regarded with the same confidence as physicians? Finns trust public schools more than almost any other public institution? That must be what heaven is like. In my dystopian present, nothing could be farther from the truth. I am openly mocked by students for what seems to them as ineptitude when I don’t teach an objective exactly the same way as their previous teacher taught it to them (don’t get me started on how infuriated I can become when this happens). Students are insanely disrespectful in other ways, such as when I give them a writing assignment for talking (“Mane, I ain’t gonna do it” or “This mane be writin’ down checks and givin’ out writin’ assignments, mane!” or “It’s ovah with!” or “Dis mane’s just a school boy”). Also (a commonplace complaint), when I send students to the office, a slightly hyperbolized metaphor would be that they usually receive a tickle on the wrist with a feather while lounging, being fanned with palm fronds, and fed grapes by beautiful servants. Unless every adult that I heard talk about school when they were young was lying, I assume that there was a time when teachers had a certain swagger and air of respect about them in the community, and maybe that still exists in some long forgotten corner of the nation. Unfortunately, those days are long gone due to our, perhaps masochistic, infatuation with sensationalized bad news. You know... a teacher sleeping with a student here... a student being whipped with a weight lifting belt there. The combination of too many isolated incidents of bad people doing bad things while under the label of “teacher” and the media licking their chops for any egregious activities to report have forever crippled the image of teachers in the United States.